Famicom World

Review

Nintendo released the Data Recorder (HVC-006) for the Famicom. The Data Recorder is pretty much the typical tape player. You can use it to listen to music through your television. The device also has the unique feature of allowing you to save the data you’ve created using Nintendo BASIC, the program that lets you mess around with sprites and sound on the BASIC cartridge.

The Data Recorder has the standard buttons that a tape player would have: Play, Stop, Rewind, Fast Forward, etc. When you push Eject the top translucent cover to the player will pop open and allow you to remove the tape. The Recorder also came with its own exclusive Nintendo cassette tape.

It’s kind of weird when you save data or play the tape, because the audio sounds a lot like a dial-up modem. This is because the data is converted to analog, much like that of a modem. It’s just a standard tape deck, though, so any random tape deck, or voice recorder for that matter, would be interchangeable with it.

The Data Recorder is not a common item, and when sold complete, sells over $50 every time.

The Data Recorder uses cassette tapes to record.


An official Nintendo cassette tape.


A Data Recorder advertisement.


The Data Recorder's manual.